Chapters 10, 11, and 12, Witchlight
Plus a giveaway of The Executioners Three!
Before we dive into the next Witchlight chapters, be sure to check out the Goodreads Giveaway for The Executioners Three! Tor Teen is giving away 100 copies!
Now, onto the main event! It’s been a while since I shared new Early Access chapters, so I’ve got three chapters for you today—which marks THE END OF PART ONE. 👀
So enjoy!
Chapter Ten
As Vivia read the letter from the Empress of Cartorra, she forgot entirely that she stood in a magically lit stairwell in the middle of a crumbling, ice-filled mountain.
For Queen Vivia Nihar: I write to you to offer my assistance in reclaiming your throne from your father.
In return, I ask only that you send your current forces east to aid me. You will see a map below with the best route north via sea and river to Poznin, and your recently acquired Dalmotti cannons would be of great assistance against the Raider King.
The rest of the letter was a detailed description of how the Cartorran Empress would use Vivia’s Foxes in direct battle, followed by how Safiya would in turn help Vivia reclaim her throne.
It was absolutely mind-boggling, and it took all of Vivia’s mental power to simply remain upright with the letter held toward the light. The Empress seemed to fare no better.
“By the waters of the Fire Well,” Vaness swore several paces away. Then, with an almost breathy laugh, she told Vivia, “According to this letter, Safiya already has an agreement with General Fashayid to return my throne to me. No fighting or armies are necessary.”
How? Vivia wanted to ask. How is that even possible?
And suddenly, it was all too much. Vivia was inside a blighted mountain having run into two lost Hell-Bards after sleeping ice nearly ate her and a quake opened up a direct path to them. And on top of that, these Hell-Bards had been actively seeking Vivia and Vaness.
There are no coincidences.
Except when there are.
It felt as if the stairs had flipped and the cavern was opening wide beneath her. Vivia dropped the letter and sank to her knees, trying to breathe. Now was not the time for an attack. Now was not the time to let the oppressive weight of an entire mountain haul her down. Be a bear, Little Fox. Be a bear.
“Majesty,” Cam murmured, sitting beside her with worried speed. “Majesty, are you all right? Let me take the pack. I’ll get you water. Food.”
“I’m fine,” she tried to say. “I just . . . need . . .” To breathe. Her chest felt like storm clouds. Her mind felt like hurricanes.
A second person sat on her other side. The Empress’s scent of citrus and iron tickled against her. “Breathe,” Vaness said in Marstoki. “Breathe, Vivia.” Her fingers laced into Vivia’s. She held fast.
And Vivia breathed. One, two, three. Then she pulled on her mask and became a bear. “You . . . have a map.” She dragged herself to her feet. Her fingers were still woven into Vaness’s, and the Empress rose with her. “Give it to us.”
The woman, Lev, immediately obeyed, pulling a thick vellum scroll from a tube on her belt. But rather than accept it, Vivia glanced at Cam: “Take it. You know this mountain better than anyone else here. See if you can find a way out of this place.”
“Hye, Majesty.” A sharp salute. Then he snatched the map and scurried toward the nearest Firewitch sconce.
The Hell-Bard Lev’s lips pursed, like she was biting back a laugh. And some of Vivia’s mask became real; some of her protective bear instincts flared hotter. “The boy,” she said in Cartorran, “might be young, but he is one of our best.”
“Oh, I believe it,” Lev replied. “Because he reminds me of this guy”—she cocked her head at Zander—“when he was first starting out.”
The giant only smiled. Of everyone in the stairs, he seemed the most serene. The least worried or unsettled by the total darkness and endless stone surrounding them. Air spiraled down from the hole in the ceiling, exhaling frost every few minutes with a low, almost imperceptible sigh.
Vivia turned away from him and joined Cam beside the sconce. It was an ancient lamp, the glass warped and bubbled. The wick within requiring no fuel to feed it. And around the flames were more of those triangular shapes Vivia had first seen carved on the magic door into the mountain.
“Majesty,” Cam whispered in Nubrevnan as she joined him. “I don’t like this.”
That makes at least two of us.
“It just feels too easy,” he went on. “The hole opening up, us finding the Hell-Bards—and even this map.” He tapped at part labeled the Way Below. “This isn’t what it looked like before, when I was here with Ryber. And not just because the mountain’s changing right now—I mean, it’s all different.”
“How so?” Vivia frowned, first at the map. Then at Cam’s puckered face.
“Look. See all these doors drawn here in Paladins’ Hall? There are nine doors in that cavern. But these seven here—they’re the magic portals that lead across the Witchlands. This one is the portal we took, and it even says Nubrevna.” He tapped at one on the right edge of the map. “We were supposed to go through this one labeled Lovats,but we got sidetracked over here.”
“Hye,” Vivia said, eying the room labeled The Past. “And I assume this spot labeled The Future is the tunnel you spoke of? With the ice inside and frozen Sightwitches?”
“Exactly. And look, right here, in the middle of the Future.” The urgency in his voice suggested Vivia was missing something obvious.
“It looks like more doorways.”
“Hye, magic doorways. They’re drawn the same way as the ones over here, and they’re labeled too. This one says Windswept Plains and this one says Contested Lands.”
“All right,” Vivia answered slowly. “And those magic doorways are not supposed to be there?”
“No, they’re not. I went in that tunnel with Ryber, remember? And there were no portal doors. Not to mention, I know where the original seven go. They’ve never led to the Plains or to the Contested Lands.”
“I still don’t understand, Cam.” Vivia lifted a helpless shoulder. “What does it mean if there are two new doorways? You said yourself, the mountain is changing right now.”
“Yeah, but not like this. The mountain can’t just make new doors. The first portals were built a thousand years ago by Paladins!” His voice had risen. He hastily yanked it back down to a whisper. “That’s what Ryber told me. She said only a powerful witch can do the necessary magic. It also requires big stones and Threads and . . . and complicated stuff.”
“I see,” Vivia said on a sigh—and she did. “You think someone is building new portals.”
“Exactly, Majesty. And then they’re putting those portals on a map.”
“Could it be Ryber?”
“Maybe,” Cam acknowledged, but the slant to his brow suggested otherwise. “But I just . . . I feel it in my gut that it ain’t. I know I’ve led us wrong once today—”
“Please stop blaming yourself, Cam.”
“—and I don’t want to do that again. But really . . . I’ve got a bad feeling about this map. And,” he dropped his voice to mere exhale, “I’ve got a bad feeling about those Hell-Bards.”
Hye, Vivia agreed. Me too. Aloud she said, “Thank you, Cam. I appreciate your insights. Now if you could pick a direction to get us off these stairs, then we can get moving before all this standing still leads me to madness.”
Chapter Eleven
For several miles, through evergreens and snowdrifts, Aeduan let himself sink into the hunt. He was a collection of thoughts. Of actions. He was not his mind, he was not his body. He was nothing more than the coastal storm and weeping father of two blood scents he wanted to catch up to.
The course ran downhill. Then uphill. Then zagged around thickets and past holly bushes pocked with red. Always, it trended westward. Higher into the Ohrins, and always it followed the easiest course through forest and stone.
The scents grew faint though, weakening by the second.
Until they ran out entirely. Six miles, Aeduan calculated, and almost to the edge of the lands that belonged to Eron fon Hasstrel.
Aeduan sniffed. Flexed his fingers at his sides. If the trail ran cold here, then that meant this was the way the Hell-Bards had come from. Not gone to. It was useful information to have, which was why he’d followed it this far. But it was not his targets nor their end destination. So he spun on a heel, kicking up snow, and returned, faster now, to the Well. Surefoot’s ears swiveled as he raced past. She opened groggy, long-lashed eyes. Recognized him. Snorted. And sank once more into slumber.
This time, the trail moved eastward, and the scents grew stronger with each claimed footstep. So strong, in fact, that Aeduan expected he might come across the Hell-Bards at any moment. If he was lucky, they too would have made camp for the night.
Aeduan was not lucky. Instead Lady Fate abandoned him a mere mile later, as sharply as if she had dropped the knife herself. All blood scents broke off and Aeduan found himself in a clearing filled with snow. At the heart was a granite slab several feet taller than Aeduan and three times as wide. Thick drifts hugged it; ice had gathered in its cracks, creating lines like the Cleaved.
Aeduan hurried behind the rock, hoping the blood scents would continue. But they didn’t, and Aeduan could guess why.
This must be the secret doorway into the mountain. The doorway Iseult and Safi—and their Hell-Bard companions, including Zander and Lev—had used to reach Cartorra many weeks ago. There were several such doors scattered across the Witchlands, each portal leading into a mountain filled with stars.
When Iseult had described it to Aeduan, he had struggled to imagine it—until flickering memories from Nadje had surfaced to show him the scale. The spirit swifts flying inside a crevasse with no end. The glowing blue that marked the seven portals carved inside the mountain.
Now Aeduan was faced with such a doorway, except it was shut. There was no magic to radiate off the granite, no bright hole through which he might crawl. The Hell-Bards must have done so, but the door had somehow sealed up behind them.
Aeduan and his hunt were finished already.
He lifted his chin to study the stone from the bottoms of his eyes. His orders were to continue westward, for there were two more pesky doms resisting their new Empress’s rule. But those orders had come from Eron fon Hasstrel and Monk Evrane. And although Safiya might have agreed that Aeduan’s skills were useful for a task of the violently persuasive nature . . .
He was certain she would much rather know that her missing Hell-Bards had been here. Recently, too, and alive.
Iseult is also east, Aeduan thought, and once more, he cast out his Bloodwitchery, reaching for a scent like fireflies stained on a silver taler. It wasn’t there, no matter how much he might wish it to be.
Aeduan’s nostrils flared. He tapped at the knives strung across his chest. He could easily use a Voicewitch to send this news of the Hell-Bards; as much as he might wish for it, there was no reason for him to return to the Solfatarra and deliver the information in person.
He lowered his chin, decision made—even if it was one he did not look forward to. However, as he twisted to return to the Well and to Surefoot, a third blood scent trickled into his nose. Skated across his magic. Likely it had always been there, but only by reaching for Iseult had Aeduan caught a whiff of it. Clear lake waters and frozen winters.
Leopold fon Cartorra. The Rook King. That Paladin of Aether who had cursed Aeduan with a soul not his own—he had also been here. Either just before the Hell-Bards, or more likely alongside them.
It was unsurprising, for if Aeduan were the broken bear from Saldonica, then Leopold was the cruel Herdwitch who always made him dance.
Because Leopold made everyone dance. It was his nature. It was the truth of his Trickster self.
Aeduan sniffed again, just to confirm there was no deeper scent here nor the possibility of tracing the former prince’s path. But there was nothing, and already this one sliver of Leopold’s blood was fading into the night.
Within seconds, Aeduan lost hold of it entirely. And within seconds, he was charging back toward the Well—now with a new urgency. A new excitement. For as furious as he was to discover Leopold lurking and scheming and forcing more bears to dance, this was not news that could be sent via Voicewitch. This was a message and a story Aeduan would have to deliver in person.
“Sorry, girl,” he said once he reached Surefoot’s side again. “I lied. We are traveling tonight. But at least, on the bright side, it will be almost entirely downhill.”
Chapter Twelve
Cam chose up as their destination because up was away from the tunnel filled with ice—and the new doors—and up would eventually lead to the Sightwitch Sister Convent and freedom from this mountain.
Vivia insisted the Hell-Bards lead their ascent, and they were amenable. If they sensed Vivia or Cam didn’t trust them, they gave no sign of it. And when Vivia probed them about who had made their map, they only ever had one answer: It came with the letters.
And who gave you the letters?
Safiya fon Cartorra, of course.
There was a missing piece there—Vivia felt it. As did Cam’s gut, since the first time Zander answered this question, Cam hung back to whisper: “There’s somethin’ wrong about that reply.”
“Any idea what?”
“No, Majesty.” A grimace on his shadowed face. “But I’ll let you know if I think of anything.”
The boy thought of nothing before they left the stairs. Nor did Vivia. In fact, soon all her focus was on simply not passing out. The stairs weren’t steep, but there were hundreds upon hundreds of htem, always cast in sputtering firelight and darkness. Vivia’s thighs shrieked at her. Her spine too, under the weight of her pack.
Eventually the stairs gave way to a snaking tunnel lit with foxfire. It was roughly hewn, almost a circle in the earth like a giant worm had once come this way.
After taking a brief pause to drink from Vivia’s single canteen and the Hell-Bards’ two water bags—almost empty now—Cam spotted Vivia frowning. “Don’t worry,” he told her. “There’s water in the workshop. We can refill there.”
This was a relief, and Vivia quickly translated Cam’s words for the others. Which prompted Lev to moan her joy before draining off the rest of her water. Zander, however, only nodded soberly. And also only sipped once, before returning the bag to his hip.
He caught Vivia watching him as he did so, and she took the chance to say something she’d wanted to from the start: “You are Hell-Bards no longer. We heard the magic that bound you was destroyed. That you’re all witches once more.”
“Yes,” he agreed a bow of his head.
Vaness stiffened nearby. “You can control plants once more, Zander? And Lev, you can heal?”
“Sort of.” Lev grimaced as she buckled her water bag to her hip. “It comes in spurts. We aren’t comfortable with it yet, are we, Zan?” She glanced at her partner, and it hadn’t escaped Vivia’s notice that Lev was the chattier half of their pair—yet when Zander did speak, everyone homed in to listen.
Just as they did right now. Even Cam, who couldn’t speak Cartorran, slanted toward the giant.
“I miss being outside,” Zander said. The foxfire throbbed around him. “But being here, without grass and trees and leaves, is still so much better than it ever was without any magic at all.”
Vivia’s shoulders tensed toward her ears at those words. She’d spent weeks fighting the temptation of her tides. It had not been easy, and she’d wished so desperately that this deluge might cease so she once more could savor her tides and rivers and rains.
Even that, though—that pained resistance that she chose—was infinitely better than having no connection to her magic at all. Right now, she could feel the water in Zander’s bag. Just a few mouthfuls that sang to her, as did the water in her own pack. But what would it feel like if those songs were gone?
Without her Tidewitchery, she was nothing. Not a little fox, and certainly not a bear.
She rubbed at her Witchmark—as did the Empress a few steps away—before murmuring that Zander and Lev could keep walking. Vivia wanted out of this mountain. No more breaks, if she could avoid it.
It was another half hour before they reached the room labeled Workshop. Cam’s guidance had led them true. With multiple floors and stairwells, with shelves and tables and books in countless shapes and sizes, the space was everything Vivia could imagine might fill an experimental laboratory. Papers, glass bottles, metal contraptions. All of it perfectly immobile, perfectly untouched by time.
And all of it lit by foxfire. Hundreds of fungal fans climbed over the space, on the walls and ceilings and shelves. The glow was so bright, Vivia had to squint at first to even see as she stalked inside. Her hands came to her eyes.
A child giggled.
Vivia snapped her hands down. Her breaths turned scattershot as she glanced around, searching the shadows. But there was no one there. Only Cam and Vaness hurrying in behind her. Then the Hell-Bards too.
“Water!” Lev cried as she launched through the workshop to a series of pumps on the walls. “It looks just like the prince’s lab, doesn’t it, Zan? Maybe we can find a flying machine in here too. Although, I guess that wouldn’t be too useful if we can’t get out of the mountain.”
Zander didn’t respond, and rather than follow Lev to the pumps, he turned to stare at Vivia. His eyes, which had seemed auburn in the stairwell’s firelight, now looked green. His beard too, and his faintly freckled skin.
She had the sudden suspicion he might have heard the child’s laughter as she had.
“There’s a spell on the room,” Cam said in Nubrevnan, nudging in closer to Vivia. He hugged his arms over his chest. “A preservation spell. That’s what Ryber told me, and it’s why there’s no dust, no spiders, no nothing. It’s all exactly like Eridysi left it.”
“Eridysi,” Vaness repeated, and now she huddled to Vivia’s other side. “How is that even possible? How is anyof this possible?”
Vivia wondered the same, but where such questions struck awe in the Empress, Vivia felt only horror. Eridysi was a woman who’d written a sad song a thousand years ago; she was a Sightwitch no one really remembered; she was as relegated to legend as Lady Baile or the Fury.
Which meant she was not supposed to be real, and her Lament wasn’t supposed to be real either.
Vivia shook herself. “I don’t want to stay here. Let’s keep moving.”
“Hye,” Cam agreed. “The door’s straight ahead. Through that hallway across the room. I’ll show you.” He scampered ahead. Vivia trailed behind. Zander too.
The sheer size of him made Vivia want to cower—which wasn’t his fault. And nothing about him cued aggression. Yet Vivia found her strides lengthening to get away from him. The foxfire fans wavered as she passed. The air seemed too thin.
She was ten steps into the hall when she heard a barking cry. Cam, she thought, and now she fully ran while Zander galloped behind. They rounded a curve. They saw the boy.
He was fine. Or at least, he wasn’t suddenly dead or eaten by ice. Instead he leaned his against a massive wooden door, his head hanging in his hands. “We can’t get through,” he mumbled as Vivia skidded to a stop beside him. The boy didn’t look at her. “We can’t get through, Majesty. This”—he punched a single fist against the planks—“needs a special key that only Sightwitches have. Unless we can find one of those keys in the workshop, we can’t get through.”
Vivia stared at the door, trying to process Cam’s words. There was no knob to turn, and only a single hole where a key was clearly meant to slot.
“It doesn’t open?” Zander asked, joining them. He spoke in his rounded Cartorran.
Vivia nodded. “Locked,” she said numbly.
“May I . . . try something?” He gestured to a spot between Vivia and Cam.
And Vivia simply shrugged. “Sure.” She gripped Cam by the sleeve and towed him out of the giant’s way. But where she thought the Hell-Bard would fling his enormous body against the door, he instead placed both hands upon the wood. His fingers splayed. His eyes closed.
The foxfire brightened toward blinding. So much so that Cam recoiled and Vivia had to shade her eyes. Yet she heard . . . then felt as the wood responded to Zander’s magic. She hadn’t known such a thing was possible—any Plantwitches she’d ever met in Nubrevna had only ever worked with living plants. But long-dead wood? Long-carvedand -nailed and -hidden wood inside an ancient mountain?
This Hell-Bard must have incredible power.
A groan filled the hall, like metal bending against stone. It was impossible to see in all the light, but Vivia thought the door might be opening. Splitting down the middle as wood fought against hinges.
Then it was done. The light receded, and now Zander was the one to groan. His knees gave out beneath him. Vivia and Cam darted forward, but he was so big. So limp. He crashed down, knocking wood and splinters on the way.
“Zan!” Lev shouted, trampling into the hall. “No, no, no, you stupid man!” She dropped to his side, and Vivia dropped with her. Together, they hauled Zander onto his back. He was bleeding from his nose. Gushing, actually.
“Vaness!” Vivia bellowed toward the workshop. “Get the healer kit from my pack! Now!” She knew what to do here. This was the same curse that struck the Empress if she used too much power. They had tools to help . . .
But the tools never reached Vivia or Zander or Lev. Instead, the ice did. Black-veined and hungry, it screeched in through the broken door at a speed no human could ever match. Vivia tried. Her arms shot high, her legs sprang her upright to flee. But such instincts were useless against an enemy that wasn’t alive and never had been.
The ice covered Zander, entombing him in a single heartbeat.
Then it claimed Lev. And it claimed Vivia too, embracing her, caressing her like a mother coaxing her into sleep. Come, come, the ice will hold you.
The last thing Vivia sensed before she lost all sight and sound was the presence of two little girls. They giggled and clapped and watched as the ice did its work.
“The queen of hounds, the queen of hawks, and the king of bats,” the taller one said in a language that was familiar enough to understand, but too foreign to identify. “That sounds like it should start a joke, doesn’t it?”
“Not a very funny one,” the smaller girl replied.
“It will be funny, though. Once all the six are together, everyone will have to laugh.” As the last slivers of ice shrouded over Vivia’s eyes, the taller girl smiled—at Cam, Vivia thought, although she couldn’t turn to see. “Oh, hello,” she said. “You must be the Nine of Hounds. Do not be frightened. Nine is sacred inside this mountain, for only with nine can one ever think beyond.”